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Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 11:13 AM 0 comments
My new home is at http://scienceblogs.com/primatediaries.
Update your RSS feed by clicking here and I look forward to hearing from you on the comments page!
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Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 8:05 AM 3 comments
Labels: blogging
Unicolonial ants pose challenge to "selfish gene" theory.
Unicolonial ants carry polydomy [multiple nests in a supercolony that all individuals rotate through] and polygyny [multiple queens in one nest] to extremes. Colonies are huge, each being a network of hundreds or thousands of nests, each with multiple queens. There is no worker aggression, and there is free movement among nests on a vast scale. The energy that might have been put into fighting and territoriality flows into the common good, more ants.Such a concept, a form of genuine anarchism in the animal world, was thought to be impossible given existing theory. These ants live in colonies where relatives exist but, with so much migration throughout a network stretching thousands of kilometers, each ant worker is mostly surrounded by total strangers that share none of their genes. Only one other species has ever been known to organize themselves in such a fashion (and if you're reading these words right now you know who you are).
The extreme cooperation of unicolonial ants has been suggested to be an example of selection occurring on levels higher than the individual, such as the superorganism, group or even population.Group selection is the idea that, under certain circumstances, genes will be selected for because they benefit the overall success of the group rather then simply the individual. While it is usually assumed that these populations will have a high level of relatedness (making the promotion of the group an extended form of kin selection) the authors suggest a scenario in which group selection could apply even among unrelated group members.
In our obsession with antagonisms of the moment, we often forget how much unites all the members of humanity. Perhaps we need some outside, universal threat to make us recognize this common bond. I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world.So under this possibility a common threat to all colony members would outweigh the low level of genetic similarity because, unless everyone pulls together, the entire group is in jeopardy. If one colony was competing with a rival colony then selection for individual selfishness could drive the population to extinction while selection for cooperation would allow the colony to thrive.
Under this view, extant unicolonial populations are the ones that have not yet succumbed to selfishness. Relatedness and mutual policing select against selfishness in non-unicolonial populations, but stop applying when relatedness decreases to zero. . . [However], constraints arising from the natural history of the species or pleiotropic effects of selfish genes, might prevent selfish genotypes from arising even under zero relatedness.This cooperation could then continue long after the initial threat was gone under the force of phylogenetic inertia. Perhaps, in the future, selection would cause the unicolony to break into smaller, more genetically similar colonies once the impetus for group selection no longer exists? Or perhaps the benefits of cooperating with strangers simply outweighs the costs of competition and natural selection has produced a genuinely altruistic society?
Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 4:58 PM 9 comments
Labels: evolution, multilevel selection
Anup Shaw over at Global Issues has collected an exhaustive collection of recent analysis on the loss of biodiversity in the last few years.
As I wrote in my recent post Rivalry Among the Reefs, the loss of up to 1/3 of coral reefs in recent years could result in unprecedented extinctions of ocean biodiversity.
While occupying only 0.2 percent of the world’s oceans, coral reefs sustain 25 percent of species diversity; an oceanographic public works project that has been in existence for 3.5 billion years. . . Current estimates are that one-third of the world’s coral reefs are in imminent danger of extinction. In an international survey of these most diverse ecosystems in our oceans, researchers determined that global climate change is increasing the average temperature of the Earth’s oceans. This is killing the photosynthetic algae that has adapted into a pristine symbiotic relationship with their hosts. Coral bleaching on a global scale is the result and mass extinction will be the inevitable conclusion unless this trend is reversed.But loss of biodiversity in the oceans is only one region currently experiencing crisis. The collection of studies and warnings from experts around the world that Anup has gathered are truly staggering. See below for a sample of some of what he posts:
Already resources are depleting, with the report showing that vertebrate species populations have declined by about one-third in the 33 years from 1970 to 2003. At the same time, humanity’s Ecological Footprint—the demand people place upon the natural world—has increased to the point where the Earth is unable to keep up in the struggle to regenerate.- World Wide Fund for Nature, October 24, 2006
The world environmental situation is likely to be further aggravated by the increasingly rapid, large scale global extinction of species. It occurred in the 20th century at a rate that was a thousand times higher than the average rate during the preceding 65 million years. This is likely to destabilize various ecosystems including agricultural systems.- Jaan Suurkula, Physicians and Scientists for Responsible Application of Science and Technology, February 6, 2004
If current estimates of amphibian species in imminent danger of extinction are included in these calculations, then the current amphibian extinction rate may range from 25,039–45,474 times the background extinction rate for amphibians. It is difficult to explain this unprecedented and accelerating rate of extinction as a natural phenomenon.- Malcom MacCallum, Journal of Herpetology, July 17, 2007
Junk-food chains, including KFC and Pizza Hut, are under attack from major environmental groups in the United States and other developed countries because of their environmental impact. Intensive breeding of livestock and poultry for such restaurants leads to deforestation, land degradation, and contamination of water sources and other natural resources. For every pound of red meat, poultry, eggs, and milk produced, farm fields lose about five pounds of irreplaceable top soil. The water necessary for meat breeding comes to about 190 gallons per animal per day, or ten times what a normal Indian family is supposed to use in one day, if it gets water at all.- Vandana Shiva, Stolen Harvest, (South End Press, 2000), pp. 70-71
Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 10:15 AM 0 comments
Labels: climate crisis, conservation
The Reef Tank is currently hosting my new post that tells the story of one of the largest controversies in the history of science. It involves Charles Darwin, a son defending his father's honor and the threat of nuclear annihilation. Intrigued? Go over and check it out, as well as some great posts by other fellow science bloggers. Here is a quick taste:
It took the threat of nuclear annihilation between the two greatest powers of the 20th century to solve one of the most profound scientific controversies of the 1800s. In 1952 Dr. Harry Ladd, a researcher for the US Geological Survey, convinced the US War Department to drill holes deep into the Bikini and Eniwetok Atolls just prior to their obliteration by hydrogen bombs. The reason for the drilling had little to do with the nuclear tests as part of Operation Crossroads, but was simply to conduct an experiment based on the hypothesis of coral reef formation first proposed by Charles Darwin in 1837.
Read the rest here.
Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 9:08 AM 0 comments
Labels: evolution, history of science
Less Gorillas in the Mist and more "gorillas getting pissed."
When I went back the next day, it was all very quiet, as if they were nursing
gorilla-sized hangovers.
Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 2:14 PM 0 comments
Our primate cousins could turn the question of human origins upside down.
“I really strongly feel that people may have evolved from this region,” he said. "It’s a big claim, yes, I understand, but I really think it is worth it to put it on the table."
This suggests that an exclusively East African origin of the hominid clade is unlikely to be correct. It will never be possible to know precisely where or when the first hominid species originated, but we do know that hominids had dispersed throughout the Sahel and East Africa by 6 Myr.Furthermore, Australopithecus bahrelghazali (about 3.6 mya) was also discovered in Chad, suggesting that there is a great deal of material still to be discovered in this region. Later hominin fossils have also been discovered in South Africa (such as Australopithecus africanus and Paranthropus robustus). This means that the distribution of hominins extends all the way from Chad to East Africa to South Africa. Interestingly, the nearest central point between all these locations is the Democratic Republic of Congo.
"The bonobo may more closely resemble the common ancestor of all three modern species," De Waal says. "It's an important issue that's yet to be resolved."
Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 8:22 AM 5 comments
Labels: bonobo, evolution, fossil humans
A new Nightline report travels to the war ravaged Democratic Republic of Congo to interview Bila-Isia Inogwabini, the World Wildlife Fund researcher who discovered an unknown population of nearly 2,300 bonobos. Considering that some researchers estimate there to be fewer than 10,000 bonobos alive in the wild, this discovery was hailed as a major development in the effort to save the species from extinction.
I was introduced to Bila a few years ago while working on my article Behind Enemy Lines for Wildlife Conservation. At the time he was just preparing his expedition to the Lac Tumba region of Western Congo. His team's findings were subsequently published in the Cambridge University journal, Oryx (subscription required).
Watch the Nightline report below:
For additional bonobo related posts see Bonobo (Re)Visions, Bonobos "Red in Tooth and Claw" and my interview with bonobo researcher Frances White.
Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 5:53 PM 2 comments
Labels: bonobo
As reported in the latest edition of Nature, government officials in Turkey have just censored the leading science periodical, Bilim ve Teknik (Science and Technology) for placing Charles Darwin on the cover. The editor was subsequently fired by the government agency that supports the magazine and many Turkish scientists are justifiably outraged.
In Turkey, as in many countries, the civil service is expected to mirror the ruling party's ideology. So, although they are keen funders of research, most senior government officials, in common with most of the population, do not believe in evolution by natural selection. The education minister Hüseyin Çelik, for example, has proclaimed his belief in intelligent design.
In the 1970s, political Islam started to gain strength in Turkey as well as the rest of the Muslim world. Evolution became a minor culture war item, as a way for Islamists to demonstrate opposition to secular life without taking the risk of naming official secularism as a target. But creationism came into its own only in the mid 1980s, when in the aftermath of a short period of military dictatorship, religious conservatives gained control of the Turkish Ministry of Education. These conservative Muslims thought evolutionary ideas were morally corrosive, yet they found themselves in an environment where science commanded significant cognitive authority. So they needed a way to suggest that evolution was a fraudulent, scientifically dubious idea. They found the resources they needed in American “scientific creationism,” and invoked Christian creationists in a curious mirror image of the way Turkish secularists regularly relied on Western scientific authorities.So there you have it. In an effort to reject Western secular ideas, fundamentalist Turks have embraced the Western fundamentalist rejection of science and reason. You wouldn't think that the very people that are most vocal about promoting war in the Middle East (isn't it curious how those most apt to honor the "prince of peace" are so ready to go to war) would also be the ones that conservative Muslims would be listening to for their approach on science and education. I guess that just shows that there is common ground between seemingly incompatible societies (though it doesn't offer us much hope at present).
Posted by Eric Michael Johnson at 6:19 AM 0 comments
Labels: evolution, middle east
The Open Laboratory 2007:
The Best Science Writing On Blogs
The Sacrifice of Admetus
Discover
The Laughter Circuit
Vol. 23 No. 5 (May 2002)
Wildlife Conservation
Behind Enemy Lines
(November/December 2005)
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Journal of Human Evolution
Sociality, ecology and relative brain size in lemurs.
JHE 2009 (in press)
American Journal of Physical Anthropology
Career or Family?: Maternal style and status-seeking behavior in captive bonobos (Pan paniscus).
AJPA 2008 135(S46):126
American Journal of Physical Anthropology
Lack of inbreeding avoidance and reduction of alliance formation in matrilineally- housed bonobos (Pan paniscus).
AJPA 2007 132(S44):137